October 29

October 29 – AM           Page 37, More About Alcoholism, Chapter 3

You may think this an extreme case.  To us it is not far-fetched, for this kind of thinking has been characteristic of every single one of us.  We have sometimes reflected more than Jim did upon the consequences.  But there was always the curious mental phenomenon that parallel with our sound reasoning there inevitably ran some insanely trivial excuse for taking the first drink.  Our sound reasoning failed to hold us in check.  The insane idea won out.  Next day we would ask ourselves, in all earnestness and sincerity, how it could have happened.
In some circumstances we have gone out deliberately to get drunk, feeling ourselves justified by nervousness, anger, worry, depression, jealousy or the like.  But even in this type of beginning we are obliged to admit that our justification for a spree was insanely insufficient in the light of what always happened.  We now see that when we began to drink deliberately, instead of casually, there was little serious or effective thought during the period of premeditation of what the terrific consequences might be.

October 29 – PM          Page 160, A Vision For You, Chapter 11

Outsiders became interested.  One man and his wife placed their large home at the disposal of this strangely assorted crowd.  This couple has since become so fascinated that they have dedicated their home to the work.  Many a distracted wife has visited this house to find loving and understanding companionship among women who knew her problem, to hear from the lips of their husbands what had happened to them, to be advised how her own wayward mate might be hospitalized and approached when next he stumbled.